Police: Suspect pointed gun at officer who fatally shot him

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — An officer fatally shot a Delaware man wanted on an attempted murder charge after the suspect pointed a gun at the officer during a foot chase, police said Thursday.

New Castle County Police identified 21-year-old Keith Price of Wilmington as the man killed in the shooting outside a church a day earlier.

Price was wanted in an April 9 shooting, and authorities had obtained first-degree attempted murder warrants for his arrest, department spokesman Officer First Class JP Piser said in a statement.

Authorities located Price, who was driving through Wilmington alone Wednesday afternoon, and two officers tried to stop and arrest him.

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The officers got out of their vehicles, but Price refused to comply with their orders and drove his car toward one of them, Piser said. One officer fired their gun.

Price then crashed into an empty police vehicle before driving away from the scene, the statement said. The officers pursued him for about two miles until he crashed into uninvolved motorists in the Bellefonte area of New Castle County.

Price then fled on foot to the side of a nearby church, where he hid in large bushes, Piser said. As one of the officers pursued him, Price "reappeared and pointed a handgun at the officer," who shot him, the statement said.

Authorities provided emergency medical attention, but Price was pronounced dead at the scene. Police say a handgun was recovered from him.

Price had prior convictions in 2015 for prohibited possession of a firearm and carrying a concealed deadly weapon, Delaware Department of Justice spokesman Carl Kanefsky said.

The two officers involved, identified only as 18- and 3-year members of the Division of Police, were taken to an area hospital for treatment of undisclosed injuries. Both were released from the hospital Wednesday night.

The motorists whose vehicle was struck by Price's reported no injuries, Piser said.

Additionally, a county officer who was headed to assist was involved in a crash. That officer was uninjured, and the occupants of the other vehicle were taken to a hospital and treated for injuries that were not life-threatening, police said.

Per department policy, both officers will be on paid administrative leave while investigations are conducted. Each officer fired a weapon during the incident, said Piser, who added it was too soon to say how many times the weapons were fired.

Piser said he could not release the race of anyone involved, nor the identities of the officers.

The department's patrol officers wear body cameras, and that footage is being reviewed, he said.